Posts tagged United Nations

Humanitarians of the Year. the Medium Lobster, Fafblog (2011-03-23). Freedom! If there's one thing America loves, it's... well, war. But if there's two things America loves, it's war and torture. But if there's three things America loves, it's war, torture, and genocide. But if there are several dozen things America loves, they are war, torture, genocide, chattel slavery, apartheid,...(Linked Wednesday 2011-03-23.)

This Only Seems Bad. cherylcline, der Blaustrumpf (2011-03-08). President Obama today issued an executive order that permits ongoing indefinite detention of Guantánamo detainees while establishing a periodic administrative review process for them. The administration also announced it will lift the ban on bringing new military commissions charges against detainees that don’t already have ongoing cases in the substandard...(Linked Thursday 2011-03-24.)

UN Authorizes War. Sheldon Richman, Free Association (2011-03-17). "He who mounts a wild elephant goes where the wild elephant goes."I thought of those words of Randolph Bourne, the Progressive who became disillusioned by his fellow Progressives' enthusiasm for U.S. entry into World War I, when I heard that the UN Security Council, led by the Obama administration, voted...(Linked Thursday 2011-03-24.)

Afghan girls continue to be sexually exploited, reported the Afghan Interior Ministry
Thursday. The Ministry told Reuters that the number of sexual assaults on children has
significantly increased. The Afghanistan Human Rights Organization (AHRO) has reported that
in January a 10 year-old girl was raped in Jowzjan province and that groups of men raped a
12 year-old girl in June in Sar-I-Pol province and a 3 year-old girl in July in Jowzjan province.
Cases like these abound.

A 12 year-old girl who was raped at gunpoint by five men has publicly spoken about the
gang rape. A video of the girl and her family was posted online by the Revolutionary
Association of Women in Afghanistan. The girl pleads for
help from Afghan President Hamid Karzai. Since the video became public, the family has met
with Karzai, who has reportedly fired the police chief where the attack occurred, according
to CNN.

Relatedly, an Islamic cleric was detained for allegedly presiding over a marriage of a 7
year-old girl to a 17 or 18 year-old man. Legally, girls under 16 and boys under 18 can not
marry in Afghanistan. However, according to the United Nations Trust Fund to End Violence
Against Women 57% of Afghan girls are married before age 16, frequently to settle their
family’s debts or other disputes.

It’s important to remember that, whatever problems Afghan men may or may not have as a cultural group, the rampant violence against women and girls in Afghanistan has nothing essentially to do with some peculiar vice of Afghans, or with some peculiar vice of Muslims. The violence and the devaluing of girls’ lives and freedoms has to do with some things that are shared by all known cultures — violent patriarchy, male sexual entitlement — and a lot also to do with a set of political and economic circumstances — the political elevation and unchecked power of regional warlords with the arms and backing of the U.S. military, the ongoing civil war between U.S.-backed and Taliban-backed fundamentalist factions, the grinding poverty produced by years of war and sustained by a military occupation and an insane, U.S.-sponsored attack on Afghanistan’s most lucrative cash crop, and so on — which sustain an environment of poverty, terror, and insecurity, which the most vulnerable people — especially women and girls — bear the brunt of. War is the health of the patriarchy, and the conditions created and sustained by war and occupation and the zealous effort to impose the U.S. government’s imperial policies (such as the terror-famine drug eradication policy) on Afghanistan, are all part and parcel of the problem. As I said in an earlier post, on the issue of marrying off young girls:

One good way to make any existing form of oppression even worse is to throw the people involved in it into desperate poverty: the first victims of poverty are always the most vulnerable people within the poor community, and in places where the human dignity and well-being of women and girls is worth less than nothing to the men who hold cultural and political power, one of the things that poor families are going to “sell” is likely to be the lives of their young girls.

And the point goes not just for the specific policy of opium eradication (as disastrous and idiotic as that particular policy is), but for the whole program of U.S. Empire in Afghanistan.

Please support the life-saving work of the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan, which is working to provide refuges and schools for women, to oppose warlordism and misogynist fundamentalism, and to end the U.S. government’s ongoing occupation and war against the people of Afghanistan.

My fellow citizens, events in Iraq have now reached the final days of decision. For more than a decade, the United States and other nations have pursued patient and honorable efforts to disarm the Iraqi regime without war. That regime pledged to reveal and destroy all its weapons of mass destruction as a condition for ending the Persian Gulf War in 1991.

Since then, the world has engaged in 12 years of diplomacy. We have passed more than a dozen resolutions in the United Nations Security Council. We have sent hundreds of weapons inspectors to oversee the disarmament of Iraq. Our good faith has not been returned.

The Iraqi regime has used diplomacy as a ploy to gain time and advantage. It has uniformly defied Security Council resolutions demanding full disarmament. Over the years, U.N. weapon inspectors have been threatened by Iraqi officials, electronically bugged, and systematically deceived. Peaceful efforts to disarm the Iraqi regime have failed again and again — because we are not dealing with peaceful men.

Intelligence gathered by this and other governments leaves no doubt that the Iraq regime continues to possess and conceal some of the most lethal weapons ever devised. This regime has already used weapons of mass destruction against Iraq’s neighbors and against Iraq’s people.

The regime has a history of reckless aggression in the Middle East. It has a deep hatred of America and our friends. And it has aided, trained and harbored terrorists, including operatives of al Qaeda.

The danger is clear: using chemical, biological or, one day, nuclear weapons, obtained with the help of Iraq, the terrorists could fulfill their stated ambitions and kill thousands or hundreds of thousands of innocent people in our country, or any other.

The United States and other nations did nothing to deserve or invite this threat. But we will do everything to defeat it. Instead of drifting along toward tragedy, we will set a course toward safety. Before the day of horror can come, before it is too late to act, this danger will be removed.

The United States of America has the sovereign authority to use force in assuring its own national security. That duty falls to me, as Commander-in-Chief, by the oath I have sworn, by the oath I will keep.

Recognizing the threat to our country, the United States Congress voted overwhelmingly last year to support the use of force against Iraq. America tried to work with the United Nations to address this threat because we wanted to resolve the issue peacefully. We believe in the mission of the United Nations. One reason the U.N. was founded after the second world war was to confront aggressive dictators, actively and early, before they can attack the innocent and destroy the peace.

In the case of Iraq, the Security Council did act, in the early 1990s. Under Resolutions 678 and 687 — both still in effect — the United States and our allies are authorized to use force in ridding Iraq of weapons of mass destruction. This is not a question of authority, it is a question of will.

Last September, I went to the U.N. General Assembly and urged the nations of the world to unite and bring an end to this danger. On November 8th, the Security Council unanimously passed Resolution 1441, finding Iraq in material breach of its obligations, and vowing serious consequences if Iraq did not fully and immediately disarm.

Today, no nation can possibly claim that Iraq has disarmed. And it will not disarm so long as Saddam Hussein holds power. For the last four-and-a-half months, the United States and our allies have worked within the Security Council to enforce that Council’s long-standing demands. Yet, some permanent members of the Security Council have publicly announced they will veto any resolution that compels the disarmament of Iraq. These governments share our assessment of the danger, but not our resolve to meet it. Many nations, however, do have the resolve and fortitude to act against this threat to peace, and a broad coalition is now gathering to enforce the just demands of the world. The United Nations Security Council has not lived up to its responsibilities, so we will rise to ours.

…

Many Iraqis can hear me tonight in a translated radio broadcast, and I have a message for them. If we must begin a military campaign, it will be directed against the lawless men who rule your country and not against you. As our coalition takes away their power, we will deliver the food and medicine you need. We will tear down the apparatus of terror and we will help you to build a new Iraq that is prosperous and free. In a free Iraq, there will be no more wars of aggression against your neighbors, no more poison factories, no more executions of dissidents, no more torture chambers and rape rooms. The tyrant will soon be gone. The day of your liberation is near.

…

Should Saddam Hussein choose confrontation, the American people can know that every measure has been taken to avoid war, and every measure will be taken to win it. Americans understand the costs of conflict because we have paid them in the past. War has no certainty, except the certainty of sacrifice.

…

As we enforce the just demands of the world, we will also honor the deepest commitments of our country. Unlike Saddam Hussein, we believe the Iraqi people are deserving and capable of human liberty. And when the dictator has departed, they can set an example to all the Middle East of a vital and peaceful and self-governing nation.

The United States, with other countries, will work to advance liberty and peace in that region. Our goal will not be achieved overnight, but it can come over time. The power and appeal of human liberty is felt in every life and every land. And the greatest power of freedom is to overcome hatred and violence, and turn the creative gifts of men and women to the pursuits of peace.

That is the future we choose. Free nations have a duty to defend our people by uniting against the violent. And tonight, as we have done before, America and our allies accept that responsibility.

Come you masters of war
You that build all the guns
You that build the death planes
You that build the big bombs
You that hide behind walls
You that hide behind desks
I just want you to know
I can see through your masks

Jus ad bello

Like Judas of old,
you lie and deceive
A world war can be won
you want me to believe
But I see through your eyes
And I see through your brain
Like I see through the water
That runs down my drain

He has proven instead only his contempt for the United Nations, and for all his pledges. By breaking every pledge — by his deceptions, and by his cruelties — Saddam Hussein has made the case against himself.

…

In 1991, the Iraqi regime agreed to destroy and stop developing all weapons of mass destruction and long-range missiles, and to prove to the world it has done so by complying with rigorous inspections. Iraq has broken every aspect of this fundamental pledge.

From 1991 to 1995, the Iraqi regime said it had no biological weapons. After a senior official in its weapons program defected and exposed this lie, the regime admitted to producing tens of thousands of liters of anthrax and other deadly biological agents for use with Scud warheads, aerial bombs, and aircraft spray tanks. U.N. inspectors believe Iraq has produced two to four times the amount of biological agents it declared, and has failed to account for more than three metric tons of material that could be used to produce biological weapons. Right now, Iraq is expanding and improving facilities that were used for the production of biological weapons.

United Nations’ inspections also revealed that Iraq likely maintains stockpiles of VX, mustard and other chemical agents, and that the regime is rebuilding and expanding facilities capable of producing chemical weapons.

…

We know that Saddam Hussein pursued weapons of mass murder even when inspectors were in his country. Are we to assume that he stopped when they left? The history, the logic, and the facts lead to one conclusion: Saddam Hussein’s regime is a grave and gathering danger. To suggest otherwise is to hope against the evidence.

How can we start a war with Iraq while waging a war against terrorists all over the place?

Would the battlefront be too much to manage?

Might al-Qaida appreciate us going into Iraq?

If we attack Iraq, will we be more vulnerable to terrorists?

It’s too bad those people whom we elected to make decisions about those questions for us (President Bush, Vice President Chaney [sic] and our Republican-controlled Congress) and our nation’s National Security advisers and military leaders don’t include the [Opelika-Auburn News] on every little aspect of their planning. Our smart leaders use intelligence that is gathered by very sophisticated sources in their decision-making process. Disclosure of our secret intelligence and plans (necessarily the answers to your questions) to the liberally biased news media usually gets the people who gave the information on which we based our decisions killed or stops any further disclosure of information to our sources. I believe that our leaders have made a full assessment of those and other questions and the best courses of action have been decided upon for the best interest of our nation. All of us should fall in behind our president and whole-heartedly support him and our committed military personnel now.

…

Saddam needs to disarm now. If he does not, this superpower intends to make him. I personally believe that this conflict will be over more quickly than Desert Storm and with even fewer U.S. casualties.

Jus in bello

You fasten the triggers
For the others to fire
Then you set back and watch
When the death count gets higher
You hide in your mansion
As young people’s blood
Flows out of their bodies
And is buried in the mud

I, GEORGE W. BUSH, … do hereby proclaim Sunday, January 20, 2002,
as National Sanctity of Human Life Day. I call upon all Americans
to reflect upon the sanctity of human life. Let us recognize the
day with appropriate ceremonies in our homes and places of worship,
rededicate ourselves to compassionate service on behalf of the weak
and defenseless, and reaffirm our commitment to respect the life
and dignity of every human being.

Positives

The consequences of a decision to adhere to what I understood to be your earlier determination that the GPW does not apply to the Taliban include the following:

…

Substantially reduces the threat of domestic criminal prosecution under the the War Crimes Act (18 U.S.C. 2441).
** That statute, enacted in 1996 prohibits the commission of a war crime by or against a U.S. person, including U.S. officials. War crime for these purposes is defined to include any grave breach of GPW or any violation of common Article 3 thereof (such as outrages against personal dignity). Some of these provisions apply (if the GPW applies) regardless of whether the individual being detained qualifies as a POW. Punishments for violations of Section 2441 include the death penalty. A determination that the GPW is not applicable to the Taliban would mean that Section 2441 would not apply to actions taken with respect to the Taliban.

And there have not been large numbers of civilian casualties
because the coalition took such great care to protect the lives of
innocent civilians as well as holy sites. … When the dust is
settled in Iraq, military historians will study this war. They’ll
examine the unprecedented combination of power, precision, speed,
flexibility and, I would add also, compassion that was employed.

Q: How many people, Iraqi people, have been killed during the occupation? Do you have a figure or don’t you?

A: … And I gave answers to a Parliamentary Question on this. I
went into it in a great deal of detail. We’ve made use of NGO
estimates, and others, but the last estimate which I gave in answer
to a Parliamentary Question, and I speak from recollection but I’m
happy to have this checked, was about ten thousand.

A spike in fighting with Sunni and Shiite insurgents killed eight
Americans in the Baghdad area on Tuesday and Wednesday, pushing the
count to 1,003. That number includes 1,000 U.S. troops and three
civilians, two working for the U.S. Army and one for the Air Force.
The tally was compiled by The Associated Press based on Pentagon
records and AP reporting from Iraq.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld cited progress on multiple
fronts in the Bush administration’s global war on terrorism and
said U.S. enemies should not underestimate the willingness of the
American people and its coalition allies to suffer casualties in
Iraq and elsewhere.

Depression set in, and Jeff dealt with it by going on heavy
drinking binges. On Christmas Eve, he sat down with Debbie and gave
his first account of being told to shoot two unarmed Iraqi
soldiers.

The way he told the story, Jeff was about five feet away from two
Iraqis — each about his own age — when he was ordered to shoot
them. He said he looked them in their eyes before closing his own,
then pulled the trigger.

He took off two dog tags around his neck, threw them at me and
said, Don’t you understand? Your brother is a murderer,
Debbie said.

A former U.S. Marine staff sergeant testified at a hearing Tuesday that his unit killed at least 30 unarmed civilians in Iraq during the war in 2003 and that Marines routinely shot and killed wounded Iraqis.

Jimmy J. Massey, a 12-year veteran, said he left Iraq in May 2003 after a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress. He said he and his men shot and killed four Iraqis staging a demonstration and a man with his hands up trying to surrender, as well as women and children at roadblocks. Massey said he had complained to his superiors about the killing of innocent civilians, but that nothing was done.

The moves came amid renewed warnings from aid groups that Iraq’s
civilian population was facing a humanitarian catastrophe.

Although many of Falluja’s 200,000 to 300,000 residents fled the
city before the assault, between 30,000 and 50,000 are believed to
have remained during the fighting.

The horrific conditions for those who remained in the city have
begun to emerge in the last 24 hours as it became clear that US
military claims of precision targeting of insurgent positions
were false.

According to one Iraqi journalist who left Falluja on Friday, some
of the civilian injuries were caused by the massive firepower
directed on to city neighbourhoods during the battle.

If the fighters fire a mortar, US forces respond with huge
force, said the journalist, who asked not to be named.

The city had been without power or water for days. Frozen food had
spoiled and people could not charge their cellphones. Some
people hadn’t prepared well. They didn’t stock up on tinned food.
They didn’t think it would be this bad, he said.

At the main hospital, cut off from the rest of the city, doctors
have reportedly been treating the injured with nothing but
bandages, while the Red Crescent says people have been bleeding to
death for lack of medical attention.

Q: Hi, Mr. Secretary. I’m Sergeant Cramer (ph) from the 502nd
(Transit ?), and I was just curious to know whether or not you’ve
been bombarded with apologetic phonecalls from your critics who had
perceived a doom and gloom scenario.

(Applause; cheers.)

Rumsfeld: My answer’s off the record. (Laughter.) There were a lot
of hand-wringers around, weren’t there? (Laughter; applause.) You
know, during World War II, I think Winston Churchill was talking
about the Battle of Britain, and he said, Never have so many owed
so much to so few. A humorist in Washington the other day sent me
a note paraphrasing that, and he said, Never have so many been so
wrong about so much. (Laughter; applause.)

Jus post bellum

How much do I know
to talk out of turn?
You might say that I’m young
You might say I’m unlearned
But there’s one thing I know
Thought I’m younger than you
Even Jesus would never forgive what you do

WASHINGTON (AFP) – US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said he did not recall British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s pre-war claim that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction ready to be deployed in 45 minutes.

I don’t remember the statement being made, to be perfectly honest, Rumsfeld told a Pentagon news conference.

General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said he didn’t remember the statement either.

The claim made headlines around the world after Blair leveled it in a 55-page white paper presented to the House of Commons in September 2002.

The Iraqi people are now free. And they do not have to worry about
the secret police coming after them in the middle of the night, and
they don’t have to worry about their husbands and brothers being
taken off and shot, or their wives being taken to rape rooms. Those
days are over.

On 19 January 2004, Lieutenant General (LTG) Ricardo S. Sanchez,
Commander, Combined Joint Task Force Seven (CJTF-7) requested that
the Commander, US Central Command, appoint an Investigating Officer
(IO) in the grade of Major General (MG) or above to investigate the
conduct of operations within the 800th Military Police (MP)
Brigade. LTG Sanchez requested an investigation of detention and
internment operations by the Brigade from 1 November 2003 to
present. LTG Sanchez cited recent reports of detainee abuse.

…

I find that the intentional abuse of detainees by military police personnel included the following acts: (a) Punching, slapping, and kicking detainees; jumping on their naked feet; (b) Videotaping and photographing naked male and female detainees; (c) Forcibly arranging detainees in various sexually explicit positions for photographing; (d) Forcing detainees to remove their clothing and keeping them naked for several days at a time; (e) Forcing naked male detainees to wear women’s underwear; (f) Forcing groups of male detainees to masturbate themselves while being photographed and videotaped; (g) Arranging naked male detainees in a pile and then jumping on them; (h) Positioning a naked detainee on a MRE Box, with a sandbag on his head, and attaching wires to his fingers, toes, and penis to simulate electric torture; (i) Writing I am a Rapest (sic) on the leg of a detainee alleged to have forcibly raped a 15-year old fellow detainee, and then photographing him naked; (j) Placing a dog chain or strap around a naked detainee’s neck and having a female Soldier pose for a picture; (k) A male MP guard having sex with a female detainee; (l) Using military working dogs (without muzzles) to intimidate and frighten detainees, and in at least one case biting and severely injuring a detainee; (m) Taking photographs of dead Iraqi detainees. … These findings are amply supported by written confessions provided by several of the suspects, written statements provided by detainees, and witness statements.

…

Several US Army Soldiers have committed egregious acts and grave breaches of international law at Abu Ghraib/BCCF and Camp Bucca, Iraq. Furthermore, key senior leaders in both the 800th MP Brigade and the 205th MI Brigade failed to comply with established regulations, policies, and command directives in preventing detainee abuses at Abu Ghraib (BCCF) and at Camp Bucca during the period August 2003 to February 2004.

All of us can now agree that the fall of the Iraqi dictator has
removed a source of violence, aggression and instability in the
Middle East. … Who would prefer that Saddam’s torture chambers
still be open? Who would wish that more mass graves were still
being filled? Who would begrudge the Iraqi people their
long-awaited liberation?

It’s very important for people, your listeners, to understand in
our country that when an issue is brought to our attention on this
magnitude, we act—and we act in a way where leaders are willing to
discuss it with the media. And we act in a way where, you know, our
Congress asks pointed questions to the leadership. … Iraq was a
unique situation because Saddam Hussein had constantly defied the
world and had threatened his neighbors, had used weapons of mass
destruction, had terrorist ties, had torture chambers …

Good morning. On this day two years ago, we launched Operation
Iraqi Freedom to disarm a brutal regime, free its people, and
defend the world from a grave danger.

Et cognoscetis veritatem

Let me ask you one question.
Is your money that good?
Will it buy you forgiveness?
Do you think that it could?
I think you will find
when your death takes its toll
all the money you made
will never buy back your soul

And I hope that you die
And your death’ll come soon
I’ll follow your casket
in the pale afternoon
I’ll watch while you’re lowered
down to your death-bed
And I’ll stand o’er your grave
‘Til I’m sure that you’re dead

Coalitions of the Willing

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